Antique Oil Lamp Burners: Materials, Shapes, & More

Video Transcript

"And in here, the fixed globes you will see which is similar to what you should see on the fluid lamps. These burners actually come out of the bottom of the lanterns. They would walk the streets with holding the handle like this to their size to light up their walkway in the 1850's. This burner will slide right out and there is where your fluid will be put in and here are the small tops where the wick actually comes out on both burners. This burner itself is very similar to what you would see on one of these fluid lamps. It would look very similar to this. There is your wick which is saturated with your oil and this fluid is held inside this container and it is screwed on to a number one collar. So this is not the same but very similar to what you would see on this lamp here. It gives you an idea of what the original lamp would look like. So there is two center wicks that you pull up here and would burn your fluid. We will put that back in there. That is what this would look like on a fixed globe. It is very similar to the one next to it. This lantern is the same type of apparatus where it is fixed underneath. I will show you the bottom where it has two pieces that you put together in a spring form and pull it out and there is your fixed globe. Another similar burner on the top but also this one is brass with two small burners and what comes out of those is the wick which is saturated from the fuel underneath and the burner. So that slides back up into the globe and it attaches so that it can be carried and handled as you are walking so these were great for policeman walking the street at night or railroad station or on corners of a street at night when there wasn't any lighting. These were great to use when you walked around in town. I'm not sure how much light you got from them but that was their light source in the mid 19th Century. "